The 20th annual Claiming Crown just got under way at Gulfstream with UNO MAS MODELO winning the first of nine CC events, the $110,000 Rapid Transit at 7 furlongs. Uno Mas Modelo, the 9-10 favorite, was up in the final strides to nail the race-long leader, MAGNIFIER (11-1), even after blowing the start, costing himself about 5 lengths ... quite a performance, actually. Full results: 1-2-9-3-7.

Uno Mas Modelo, a last-out winner of the ungraded Bet On Sunshine Stakes at Churchill Downs, was ridden by Albin Jimenez for owner Loooch Racing and trainer Anthony Quartarolo. He paid $3.80 after finishing in 1:25.23 over a fast track.

All-sources handle on race 2 was more than $840,000.

All but one more of the remaining races on an 11-race Saturday card will be Claiming Crown events. I'll pop up here periodically on DRF Live with some brief synopses of races, while Mike Welsch will have a full Claiming Crown recap on www.drf.com at day's end and also will be active on Twitter as the day unfolds. 

(Just for the record, Mike is on the scene at Gulfstream and I'm filing these reports remotely from Kentucky. As usual, I won't actually be getting to Florida until later this month.)